Six Pillars of Health with Marni and Jesse Wasserman

Marni Wasserman is a nutritionist and the Author of Fermenting for Dummies and Plant-Based Diet For Dummies. Marni uses passion and experience to educate individuals on how to adopt a realistic real food diet and a balanced wholesome lifestyle through simple strategies.

Dr. Jesse Chappus retired from chiropractic after being in clinical practice for four and a half years because he felt it was time to take his health message online to reach a larger audience. Jesse is a firm believer in a proactive model of health.

On today’s podcast, Marni and Jesse Wasserman share what they believe are the six pillars of health. And, we discuss how to create a community and influence in your life to support a healthy lifestyle.

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Thank you, and we’ll see you next time on The Spa Dr. Podcast.

TRANSCRIPTION

Trevor: Hi there. I’m Dr. Trevor Cates. Welcome to The Spa Doctor Podcast. Today, I have two people on as my guests. They’re a couple, Dr. Jesse Chappus and Marni Wasserman. They are cohosts of The Ultimate Health Podcast. I was recently on their podcast, and I thought it’d be fun to have them on my podcast and interview them. It’s kind of fun to have couples on so we get a different perspective. Marni is a nutritionist and author of “Fermenting For Dummies” and “Plant-Based Diet For Dummies.” Marni uses passion and experience to educate individuals and how to adopt a realistic real food diet and balanced wholesome lifestyle through simple strategies. Dr. Jesse retired from chiropractic after being in practice for four and a half years because it was time to take his health message online to reach a larger audience, so he joined forces with Marni and so they have a podcast together.

On today’s podcast, on The Spa Doctor’s Podcast, Jesse and Marni share what they believe are the six pillars of health. These are foundational principles for what they believe are really important for health, and we also discuss how to create a community and influence in your life to support a healthy lifestyle, and I think it’s great to hear it from a couple’s perspective. They have an interesting take on it, so please enjoy this interview with Jesse and Marni. Marni and Jesse, it’s so great to have you guys on my podcast. Welcome.

Marni: Thank you. We’re excited to be here.

Jesse: Yeah, we’re pumped. Thanks Trevor.

Trevor: Yeah, so why don’t we start off with your journey of what led you guys to what you all are focused on now and also what brought you two together.

Marni: All right, well. Shall I start.

Jesse: Yeah. Go for it.

Marni: All right, so my background is in nutrition and I’m also a chef as well, so that’s kind of the whole start to my beginning so to speak. I did culinary school, and I opened up a cooking school in Toronto myself, and that’s where really my passion for healthy eating, wholesome living really started and I had a focus on plant-based nutrition. Over the years, just really delving deep into the world of Whole Foods, I started to realize that my body wasn’t responding the same way to everything that I was teaching and everything that I was doing, so over the last couple years, as Jesse and I have started to get immersed in the world of our podcast, which has been amazing.

About three years ago when we started the podcast, I had the opportunity to really open my mind to more philosophies around healthy eating, healthy living, and it really started to transform my belief system. What I once thought was the pillar of my health, being vegetarian and plant-based, has now transformed into kind of more of a wholesome, balanced way in eating and as well as living, and I’m sure we’ll get into a lot of that later on, but now, my career has totally changed from kind of an in-person brick and mortar food studio to now the online world and us having The Ultimate Podcast.

Jesse: My journey, a little bit different, I have always been interested in health, and I took kinesiology in university which led me to chiropractic after, so I went and took a four-year program, became a chiropractor, went into clinical practice for almost five years and towards the end of being in clinical practice, Marni and I started the podcast, so basically I think the overlap might have been like a year and a half. As things picked up with the show and things just started going really well, it ended up getting to a point where we had to decide where I was going to put my energy, so I decided to actually retire from practice, put everything into the podcast, and everything that surrounds that. That’s our core. That’s our weekly show we put out, but everything else around that, we’re doing a lot of other projects, and just trying to spread the health and wellness message.

Trevor: Great. Let me ask you something. Your podcast, what are some of your favorite messages that you guys have shared on your podcast?

Jesse: One that comes to mind right away for me is community and the fact that we all need to really make sure we’re connecting with like minds, people that are going to challenge us, just really looking at the people, our family and friends, in our lives and evaluating, “Are those relationships a positive influence or a negative?” If they’re a negative, we have to reallocate the amount of time we’re spending with these people, or in severe cases, you might have to cut them out over time depending on what that relationship is. Just community, as people were naturally drawn to forming communities and being in groups and sharing messages and connecting with like minds. I think that’s just so important.

Marni: For me it’s be a lot about self care and about mindfulness and really making sure that we’re implementing these daily practices every day that are for ourselves and our own well-being, and for me, making sure that you have a morning routine that completely sets you up for success during the day. Through a lot of our guests on our podcast and through our own messages, we’ve really made that core philosophy for a lot of people to really dedicate that time during the day to make sure that you take care of yourself.

Trevor: Yeah, those are both really great points. I want to talk more about those. With community, I think it is important for us. I mean, you all are creating a community with your podcast and helping bring people together and your messages that you share and the fact that the two of you are together working on your goals and your health and your messaging and all of that together. When we are around people that support our goals that can be really great, but when we are surrounded by people the opposite of that, when we’re surrounded by people that aren’t aligned with where we’re trying to go in life, it can be really challenging, right?

Jesse: Especially where, we see this a lot of times with our listeners, where they’re reach out to us and maybe one person in the relationship, say a couple has been married for a number of years, realizes there’s this whole other health and wellness world and way of living and they start to adopt a lot of these things and get really excited and try and bring those into the home for the family and their partner. If the partner’s just like, “What’s gotten into you? I don’t get this. This isn’t where I want to go.” You know? That can be a really challenge. Marnie and I, our case, what brought us together was both being in the health and wellness space. We never really had that problem, but I really feel for people who really get excited and they want to start spending money to eat better food and upgrade a lot of the stuff in the home and if the partner’s not on board, that can be a real challenge.

Trevor: Yeah, what do you think could help people along those lines? I mean, obviously you don’t want to just break up with someone because they don’t want to eat the way you do because maybe it’s just a matter of you accept people where they are, but also, maybe there are things you could do to help kind of realign with each other. Do you have any tips on that?

Marni: I think the first thing to do is for couples to maybe set aside what their core values and priorities are together and kind of seeing where those line up, and if there really isn’t a lot of matches, but yet they still really want to be together, it’s about maybe saying, “You know, every day this is what I need to do to fill up my bucket so that I can feel fulfilled. I need to meditate and eat this way,” and as long as you can support that, that’s really helpful to me because the worst thing too is to do all these things and have someone saying like, “Why are you eating that? Why are you doing this?” As long as they can be in the space of accepting what that person is up to, I think that’s really important for couples to communicate that. Otherwise, there could just be this tension and discomfort and you go on and on thinking, “Okay, we love each other. We do all these wonderful things. Intimacy’s great, but the core values aren’t lining up,” so I really think it’s important for couples to have that communication and to have that correspondence with each other.

Jesse: It’s really cliché to say, but I think leading by example is huge. Say your partner sees that you’re reaching your goal weight or your skin is starting to glow or you have more energy and you’re jumping out of bed in the morning, and your partner might be like, “What’s going on here? Some of this stuff might actually be working.” I think it can be a little bit more of a challenge in the beginning, but once you start to apply this stuff and your life starts to transform, and the partner can actually see this stuff happening, hopefully bit by bit they can start to embrace some of these principles and get caught up in the health and wellness world that we’re all in.

Trevor: There’s a huge range of what’s considered healthy. Have the two of you ever had disagreements about what you want with your health and wellness goals? Have you ever encountered issues where you have to kind of say, “Okay well I know you do it this way, but I like to do it this way,” and kind of come to an agreement on that and work around it?

Marni: Yeah, go ahead.

Jesse: Well, your story, Marni was actually plant-based for a number of years, for a lot of years, and I was too at one point, but right when we started dating, this is a number of years ago, I was starting to incorporate some fish and different meats into my diet, so our diets at that point weren’t 100% aligned, and we all know the effort that goes into making a dinner this and that. It’s hard to make two separate meals and be on a different page.

Marni: Especially when I’m cooking.

Jesse: Especially when she’s cooking. I’ve got to kind of role with what’s going on, but yeah. It ended up my diet took an evolution. I ended up going plant-based for a period of time and just over interviewing all these amazing health experts and seeing the story over and over again that people are experimenting with a plant-based diet and long-term it’s just not working for them. It got us to trying some different things and we ended up evolving together into incorporating some meats into our diet and now we’re in a place where we’re I guess eating, if you had to put a label on it, a paleo-ish diet, and we’re both on the same page, which feels good. We really know this is right for us at this time.

Trevor: Right, and I think that’s key because I keep saying “at this time” because you might find that there’s something else that comes up, especially if a health issue comes up, you might find that there’s another diet that’s going to work better for you and just working together, right? And being accommodating with each other.

Marni: Yeah, and another thing that comes up in terms of a little bit of difference is our sleep patterns. I’m an early riser, and I like to get my day started super early and Jesse likes to take his time in the morning, but he likes to stay up a little bit later at night, so that’s something we’ve kind of had to, not so much compromise on, but acknowledge where we’re both at. I’m kind of up with the dog early, get out, and then at night, he just is quiet and puts on a light while I put on my eye mask, so just things that you have to figure out when you’re on the same page overall but you have different behaviors, different patterns, different ways of functioning, and it’s about again acknowledging what those are and how to work with them.

Jesse: I love, Trevor, that you made that point where we need to embrace that, what we’re sharing and what we’re doing, and this goes for everybody. It’s just where we’re at at that moment, because there was a time when, it would have been back in my plant-based days, where I felt like I had everything figured out and this was just what I was going to do for life. Just seeing how much things have changed in a short period of time, I’ve just been so humbled and I’m just so at the point now where I’m 100% saying, “I’m almost certain things are going to change, and I’m ready for that and ready to continue to evolve and learn.” I think people just need to really approach health and wellness that way and realize that it’s not about being at the end goal. It’s just about finding your pathway and evolving as you go along.

Trevor: Right, and I want to talk more about food and hydration, sleep, and self care, but I do want to mention, because we’ve been talking about this, you all as partners and being together and doing this together, and I don’t have a partner but I do have three kids. We all have somebody in our lives that we do things with, whether we’re alone and we just spend time with people occasionally or we have people living in our homes with us. It’s about being accommodating with other people and understanding and helping support each other in our goals, I think is what we’re talking about here, wherever people are.

Jesse: For sure.

Trevor: Yeah. Okay, well great. Let’s talk about some of these really key points that you all have found to be particularly important in your own lives, also with the guests that you’ve been interviewing on your podcast. What do you find are some of these key points that you think are underlying that are just key pillars of health?

Jesse: Go ahead.

Marnie: One of our number one key pillars is about hydration and we know you’re really big on this. You need water in order to feel good, your body to feel good, and your skin to glow. We definitely know that through ourselves, and I’ve seen a lot of clients and a lot of people over the years, most people are walking around dehydrated. Through or messaging, what we’ve tried to really to show people and to tell people is that it’s so easy to carry around water with you in a glass, water bottle, and to make sure that you’re making it a priority or having fun with water by adding things like chlorophyll or lemon juice. People always complain, “Water’s so boring. What else can I have?” Or people are coffee drinkers or caffeine drinkers, how to replaces the amount of water that’s being lost with more water.

The other that we’re really big on is the quality of what that water is. We know that everyone is in so many different places around the world and has access to different things, but if they can source really good water, and spring water’s one of our favorites, but it’s not so easy for the average person to go and access, or maybe they’re not interested in doing that, but we try and give people all the options that are available, which filter systems you can get at home and how to make healthy upgrades that are within your budget.

Jesse: I think the biggest thing with a lot of these messages that we’re going to share here is to do the best in that time. If Marnie and I are going for a walk and we forget water and it’s a hot sunny day out and we’re dehydrated, maybe having some water at a water fountain while you’re out and about is the best you can do, and you want to jet hydrated, right? You don’t want to just say like, “I need to wait until I’m home, and I have this pristine water that I went and collected from a spring,” and just getting orthorexic about it. You just want to make sure that you’re staying hydrated and doing the best in each and every situation.

Trevor: Okay. I am big on clean water sources. I think we do need to be careful, of course, of the water that we’re drinking and doing our best to get clean water because I see so many people picking up parasites, heavy metals, contaminated water, and some of it is just a sip and that’s all it takes for a contaminated water source. For other people it’s more of an ongoing thing, but bringing water with you of course, I think it’s always important to plan ahead. I’m always trying to tell my kids for example, “Make sure you bring your water bottle.” We live in Park City, Utah. It’s very dry here in the summer and the winter. People get dehydrated really quickly so making sure that you’re bringing water with you, planning ahead I think is really important.

Marni: Yes, and so many people don’t do it, and it’s such a simple tip. We find that whenever we’re doing a talk at a conference and we say that, people are like, “Okay. What water bottle should we get?” Just showing people the options, and now, as we know, the water bottle industry is crazy. You can get stainless steel. You can get purple, blue, pink, polka dot, whatever you want. There are options, and again, you have to be savvy within that too because some obviously are better than others, but yes, because being practical, planning ahead, bringing something with you so that you are not stuck on the highway in rush hour without water to drink or wherever you might be.

Trevor: Okay, great. What else? In addition to hydration?

Marni: Quality food. Again, we talked a little bit about diet and our evolution for sure. “Just eat real food,” is really the philosophy, and again, we love your approach to eating, and our approach is very similar. Just eat balanced, nourishing foods. We’re big on good quality high fats, fermented foods, lots of greens. Like the core of our diet is always green. There’s not a meal or a snack sometimes that goes by that there’s not something green in there, and again, the basics with a lot of people is just really important, but make those simple upgrades as well too like the fermented foods or wild foods or things like the different superfoods you can incorporate in, just showing people what’s available to them to take their simple salad or their simple dinner plate, and how can they upgrade it a little bit more and make sure that the nutrients that they’re consuming are what their body is actually wanting.

Jesse: Obviously, we want to be avoiding processed foods, but there are a lot of, and this is happening more and more in the health and wellness space. There’s a lot of great foods that can be found in packages these days, so there’s certain protein powders and certain even plantain chips that are cooked in coconut oil. You wouldn’t want to eat those each and every day but as snacks. There’s a lot of great superfoods from around the world that you can get organic and raw and put into your smoothies, coconut oil. We like to make the point that if something is processed, it’s not always bad. Obviously, we want to make sure again we’re looking at how much we’re consuming these and the quality of them.

Marni: That it was packaged, you mean? If something’s processed-

Jesse: Yeah, sorry. If something’s processed, we don’t want to include that, but if something’s packaged, we want to make sure we’re aware of the quality, but those things can still be part of a good diet.

Trevor: Right, and I know earlier we were talking about, you were mentioning plant-based diet versus paleo diet, and I think those often times, people use those terms and I think most people know what you mean by that, but just to review, when you’re saying “plant-based” you mean a vegetarian diet is what you were referring to right? Because even what-

Marni: Yes.

Trevor: Even what you’re talking about right now is a plant-based diet.

Marni: Exactly, and you know, I don’t like any labels but just again for clarification, yes I wasn’t consuming meat or animal protein at one point in my life, and I was very much against it. I have a book, “Plant-Based Diet For Dummies.” This was what I lived by and stood by. This was my way of life, so it was very hard to break that paradigm mentally, emotionally, and physically actually eating flesh. Again, I changed that philosophy over and started incorporating more animal protein, and I guess we use the term “paleo” now because we’re not consuming a lot of grains and beans. We’re mostly eating animal protein and still lots of plants, which is why plant-based is still the core of our diet. There’s just animal protein included in that now.

Trevor: Yeah, yeah. Just wanted to clarify that. Like you’re saying, a lot of these diet changes that happen whether it’s paleo or a lot of the diets that come out, “eat right for your blood type,” all of these different types that I just think of, a lot of it when people shift into these, they’re eating more whole, real foods, and that’s why they feel so great, and of course there can be some great components of that. But I think the underlying foundation of the diets that stick around and the diets that really work for people are based upon real food, which is what you’re talking about and having that balance of the right nutrients in your food and not trying to be super extreme like it’s all about fat or it’s all about vegetables or it’s all about meat. It’s eating a balance of that. I think plant-based is a core focus of it because we do want to eat a lot of vegetables. I think most of us can agree upon that. Then trying to figure out the right amounts of animal protein or other sources of protein.

Jesse: Right, and again, that’s going to change depending on the person, depending on their goals, depending on what phase of their life they’re in. When we go and lecture on this stuff, we don’t even specify type of diet. We just again say as local as possible, organic, the stuff we’ve been talking about here. Keep it really basic and just let people experiment and see what works for them.

Jesse: All right. Sleep is such a critical one. There’s so much we could get into, but I think the biggest thing right away when I think of sleep is making sure we have our bed time locked down and we’re sticking to that each and every night. If you need to set an alarm on your phone to start winding down at 9 p.m. and maybe get into bed with a good book and some proper lighting that’s not going to affect your melatonin production, that can be a great idea. But we really are big on letting people know the importance of going to bed at the same time and getting up at the same time, including weekends.

A lot of people do stick with that when they’re more into their work routine, Monday through Friday, but when it comes to the weekend, people, they’ll get caught up maybe on their Netflix or go out to dinner and then go out to a concert after and then sleep in the next day and kind of throw everything for a loop. The important thing that we like to let people know is keep that the same, even on weekends, and maybe Marni can get into some of the things that we like to do to prep the room and just make sure we’re going to be getting that ultimate sleep.

Marni: We’re really big on creating the ultimate sleep sanctuary if you will at home. Changing up the atmosphere in your home in general before you actually get into your bedroom. That might mean dimming the lights, putting on candles, turning on some salt lamps and changing up your light bulbs. We just started doing that at home. We’ve been thinking about it for a while, but of course after our conversation with Dave Asprey yesterday, we’re changing all of our bulbs to the right light and making upgrades in our home.

All of that really does help the body to start to wind down, having a cup of tea, chamomile, lavender, whatever that might be, and then in the bedroom, blocking everything out. It’s so important, not only for your own peaceful sleep, but your body and your skin doesn’t respond to light the same way, so we’re big on blackout blinds, wearing a night mask, and keeping the room nice and cool and dark, because that is ultimately going to help you get into that sleep. The challenge for a lot of people is that they can’t fall asleep.

Well, what are you doing before bed? What are you doing in those five, ten minutes, an hour before bed? Are you on your screen in your bed? Do you have those lights on? Do you have something flickering on the back wall? That all makes a difference, and I think again, it’s taken us time to make those transitions. Even though we’ve been talking about it for years, it still takes time to upgrade your home and make all these little tweaks, but when you do it, the impact is so profound.

Trevor: Absolutely. I completely agree. Of course, we need our sleep. It impacts our health on a number of different levels, such as our hormones, our stress, our skin, a lot of different impacts, and really our aging process is impacted by our sleep. As we get older, it gets hard to get a good night’s sleep, but doing the things that you’re talking about can really help. I think when people are young, sometimes they don’t feel like … like, “Uh, I could just go to sleep and it’s no problem.” As we get older, when we go through times when our hormones are fluctuating, it can be more challenging, and these kinds of tips and tricks can be even more important during those times to get back into that rhythm. Ideally, then you don’t necessarily need them as much once you get into a really good rhythm, but to get you back on track, I think that can be really helpful. Yeah. Okay, then let’s talk about movement.

Jesse: All right, so movement. This is a good one, and obviously everybody knows the importance of exercising and having a regular routine, but it’s interesting. Over the years, my routines changed so much. There was a point in my life when for a few years I was doing marathon after marathon, a lot of long distance training, and feeling like I was benefiting, like I was having a lot of fun with the challenge and doing these races. But I also felt like I was really healthy and fit at the time. Since then, just doing a lot of the research on exercise, I’ve come to the conclusion that I was probably doing more harm than good to my body at that point.

Now, I’m more into doing things that are like low intensity. There’s some high intensity mixed in, but I like to go for a long walk out in nature. Marni and I will go take the dog and go for a walk and just spend time together while we’re doing that. That’s become more of a staple rather than going out there and before, my baseline runs were like 10 kilometers a day, day in and day out. I was just causing so much stress to my body, so I think it’s just important to realize that there is a bell curve with exercise, and we want to make sure we’re not doing too little or too much. You have to find that sweet spot. You need to be consistent.

You need to find something that’s fun for you. What I’m doing might not resonate for you. You want to find something that you’re really enjoying and that you’re going to want to do on a regular basis, so just kind of play with different things and maybe think back to childhood and some of the things you would naturally do when you weren’t forced to exercise. Maybe you were a swimmer. Maybe you were somebody that just liked going on hikes or whatever it would be and just find that thing that really works for you.

Marni: I think a lot of people don’t realize that you can do so much in such a small amount of space. You don’t necessarily need a gym membership. You don’t need to go and spend two hours off at some crossfit class or whatever it is. You can literally find a space beside your bed or in a living room or a basement and do anything from jump rope to pushups to sit ups and really get those functional movements in. That can have a huge impact on your body, on your weight loss goals, whatever it might be. I think it’s just about again, as Jesse said, scaling back and finding that rhythm that works for you.

The word “exercise” intimidates a lot of people because they immediately think they have to go to a gym and get a membership and do something more intense when really, and coming from a personal trainer background, that was my world too. Again, pulling away from that and realizing that the benefits come in finding things that you love to do. I think that’s really important to highlight. What do you enjoy doing? What makes sense to you? Is it yoga? Is it Pilates? Is it spinning? Hiking? Then what are things that you can just do around the home? I’m a really big fan of also telling people that make your day into movement. If you have to pick something up downstairs, squat into it. Lift it up. Go park at the farthest parking spot. Walk across, and do all those simple things and do them with vigor and get a little bit more out of it.

Jesse: I also feel like you really have to look at your lifestyle as a whole with exercise and realize where you’re at. If you’re somebody who’s burning the candle at both ends, hopefully not, hopefully you’re figuring out a solution to that if you are, but you don’t want to be spending your free time again going for long bike rides, long runs, things that are going to drain you even further. Maybe you want to go and look up a restorative yoga class or again, get into walking out in nature. Are these things that are going to be less intense? Really analyzing where you’re at in your life and what’s going to benefit you is just so important.

Trevor: I think that’s really key. When we’re at different points in our lives we have different needs. When I was writing my book and I was so busy working on writing and it was so draining in a lot of ways to write the book and promote the book, I didn’t have the energy to go to the gym all the time or to do really high intensity exercise. I felt more like going on walks and doing yoga and doing gentle things to help balance, because I was already over … I was pretty stressed. I think if I had pushed myself and tried to run a marathon or done something really intense and intense exercise, I would have totally burned myself out. But now that I’m through that, I’m craving intense exercise, you know going on quick trail runs and intense bike rides and things like that because I’m at a different place right now. I don’t have that same level of stress. I’m curious to see what you guys think about that, sort of just seeing where people are in life and paying attention to where your needs are in that moment.

Marni: 100%. Well, this is very true for me right now because I am drawn to intense exercise. I love spin classes. I love to run. That’s just what my personality is like. Over the last couple weeks, I’ve had some discoveries around my thyroid gland and thyroid health overall, and I’m starting to learn that less is more. That’s very hard to get my head around because you’re feeling like you want to move if you’re feeling stagnant or your energy is just not feeling good. The default is, “Let’s go exercise harder,” but what I’ve learned is that that is actually doing my body and myself a disservice. Over the last I’d say two to three weeks now, I’ve completely backed off, and I’ve noticed no change in my body or how I feel or my weight or whatever it is.

If anything, I feel better because I’m really honoring where my body is at and the rest is so important right now. I think again, we like to push against the grain, thinking we’ve always got to do more, especially if we’re feeling lazy or stagnant. You really have to be true to who you are. If you’re going through your process of writing your book, your energy is being exerted in that. Right now, my energy is being exerted in trying to heal my body. You need that knowledge. You need that self awareness to come to that conclusion and say, “You know what? I’ll get back to it. I’ll for sure start going to spin classes maybe in a couple months, and put everything I need to into that, but right now it’s time for rest.”

Jesse: I would say just don’t underestimate the power of a good walk or hike.

Marni: Yeah.

Jesse: A lot of times I feel like people don’t feel like that counts, and that can be such a phenomenal form of exercise. Again, like I mentioned before, you can do it. You can put a good podcast on like this. You can learn at the same time, which is fantastic. Get sunlight if you’re in a location where you can get sun. Get outside. Connect with friends, family. It’s just so wonderful for so many reasons, so I would say just embrace the walk on a regular basis.

Trevor: Yeah, absolutely. Okay great. You talk about self care and how important that is. Let’s talk about that.

Marni: All right. Well, this is just carving out time in the day for you, as simple as that, or finding those moments or getting reconnected with hobbies and things that you love to do. That sounds so like luxurious for a lot of women especially. They’re like, “Oh maybe on the weekend or maybe when I go away with my girlfriends next month, I’ll indulge. I’ll go to the spa.” But why can it be something you do every day? Why can’t you start carving out time in the morning, which is my prime time? I love to do that. I like to take a good hour or so and read and meditate, journal, do all these things that are really nourishing and start my day that way.

But it can also peek it’s way in throughout the day, whether it’s just stopping, taking a break from your computer, looking over at a book or taking a few deep breaths or enrolling in a cooking class or enrolling into some online course that really speaks to your passions. People need to find those groups or ways to support them. That can really help to nourish those passions. Because sometimes people are at a job every day that they may or may not love but there are other outlets that they can really express themselves and that really nourish and take care of their body.

Jesse: I think the big thing here is just to take time for yourself. A lot of times, we put ourselves last and we all know how busy life in the 21st century is, and a lot of times you’re not going to get to those things whether it be a meditation or a journal or whatever that is for you. But I like what Marnie’s doing, where she sets aside that time first thing in the morning. It’s not getting into reactive mode, checking email, social media. She is putting in her time, building herself up before she leaves for the day, and it makes you a better person throughout the day.

Marni: 100%.

Trevor: I think morning is such a great time to have that. Maybe it means getting up a little bit earlier if you’ve got people in your house and you want to have some little peace time before your kids get up, so setting the alarm a little bit earlier. Those of us that have kids, it’s not always easy to know or even, you guys have a dog. You don’t even know because there could be something that comes up and then you don’t get that hour of time, so to not be hard on yourself, realizing, “Okay well it didn’t work out this morning, that I didn’t get that time in, so I’ll figure out a time later in the day when I have a few moments.”

Maybe it’s right after lunch or right before I go to bed, having that time set aside. Even taking something like using your personal care products in the morning and taking a little extra time and giving yourself a little extra love when you’re applying your products. That could be part of that self care, just saying, “Oh my gosh. This is just so nice to have this moment to take care of myself and take a few breaths.” Maybe that’s all that self care is for that day, right?

Marni: Exactly, and I want to go back to the point of having kids or having a dog. Sometimes, you may just have to be creative too with those moments. If your kids are around and you can’t escape them, it’s like, “Okay. What activity can I let them do or get them going so that maybe I can just go sit on the couch and watch them?” But yet, “I’m listening to something,” or maybe meditating or writing something. I know our dog, who’s still a puppy, she still has needs and wants in the morning and I am up early with her, so I have to work with her. It’s just about again, being creative and finding that. Yes, some days it’s going to work better than others, so you got to play with that.

Trevor: Great, great. Then also, community is another really important part of health, a pillar of health that you all talk about. We already talked about that a little bit, because you mentioned that being something really important to you. Is there anything else you want to add to that? Because I feel like you have all these other components and having community sort of just brings it all together, right?

Jesse: For sure, and we’re so lucky these days with the internet because like we talked about before, say you don’t have a spouse or a partner that is 100% on board, at least you can go into these Facebook groups or Meet Up groups and connect with people online that are of the same philosophy. The great thing is a lot of times those groups have different meet ups where you can meet up in your location in person. I just think the internet, it’s a slippery slope because a lot of times I think people can feel like they are connected and not get out of the house and connect with people face to face, which is a whole separate component within that. We want to make sure we’re connecting in person, taking time to set a coffee date with a friend or a family member and actually getting out and connecting in person. But I think the internet is just a great way to, especially when people are into a niche like this, to just meet other people that are like-minded.

Trevor: I think that’s so important, and at The Spa Doctor, we definitely try and create a community for people to feel heard and to feel safe, to get information, to get reliable information and things. I think there is definitely that informational part and not feeling alone, that you can get online. But like you said, also being in person with people is important because with that physical touch, you can’t get that online. You can’t get an oxytocin release that you get from touching someone, hugging someone, holding someone’s hand. You just can’t get it online.

Marni: Yeah, for sure. For the in-person too, it’s about really strategizing who are those people that you want to spend the most time with, because you do really reflect, you reflect on them and they reflect on you your goals and passions, so if you’re surrounding yourself with people that aren’t lifting you up or aren’t inspiring you and you’re spending that hour of your week that you can only get to get out with that friend, make sure it’s someone who you value. Jesse and I are really big on that. I know we touched upon it in the beginning, but the quality of the people in our lives and really sifting through that, so making those connections extra special.

Jesse: I think with people like us that work a lot in the online space, it’s so important to have outlets because it’s so easy to wake up, open your computer, and we all know how fast time can fly when you start working on the computer. If you’re at home all day in front of that screen, one day can go by, two days. Then it’s like, “Holy! I better get out and like connect with people.” For me, an important part of my routine is actually going to different coffee shops with my computer, and I know it’s not like deep connections, but at least connecting and seeing other people and feeling their energy. In a small way, that’s part of what I do to stay connected.

Trevor: Perfect, perfect. Love it. Okay, well great information today. Tell everybody how they can learn more, where they find your podcast, where they find you all, and you have an app too? Also?

Jesse: Yeah, we have an app called Habits. You can get it at UltimateHealthPodcast.Com/Habits. What this does from a lot of the interviews we’ve done in the past, we’ve pulled out different healthy habits that people can cycle through and see if it’s something they want to incorporate. They create a profile. The habits they’re practicing are under there, the habits they’ve adopted. It’s just a nice way to keep organized and stay on track. I would say for the listeners here, since you’re already listening to a podcast, come and check out our show in iTunes, Ultimate Health Podcast, and we do a weekly show interviewing all kinds of health experts, and Trevor, you’re actually an upcoming guest, you’re coming out next week, so by the time this goes live, the listeners can go and check out our show with you. Yeah, we just have a lot of fun doing that, and I think if the listeners got, which I’m sure they did, something from this, they’re going to love our show.

Trevor: Great. Excellent. All right, well thank you so much for joining me today, and I will have all the links up for your podcast and your app and your community, your Facebook and all of that up on my website as well. Great. Thank you.

Marni: Thank you. Nice to chat.

Jesse: Great to connect.

Marni: Take care.

Jesse: Take care.

Trevor: I hope you enjoyed this interview today with Jesse and Marni and got some great tips on the pillars of health and how to build your community, get the support that you need to achieve your health goals. To find out more about the two of them, you can go to my website, TheSpaDoctor.Com. Go to the podcast page with their interview and you’ll find all the information and links there. While you’re there, I invite you to join the Spa Doctor community and also subscribe to the podcast on iTunes so you don’t miss any of our upcoming shows. If you haven’t done so already, I highly recommend you get your own customized skin report, skin profile at TheSkinQuiz.com. It’s a free online quiz. It will give you great information to help you with your health and skin goals. Just go to TheSkinQuiz.Com. Also, you can join me on social media, on Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, and join the conversation. I’ll see you next time on the Spa Doctor Podcast.